Adding context to content: The CENS deployment center

Scientists and engineers working with embedded networked sensing systems in the environmental sciences are acquiring data at unprecedented rates. Scientific data do not emerge from a vacuum. There is considerable contextual information that surrounds the process of data acquisition that is critical to interpret and analyze data. Current techniques for data sharing involve considerable manual effort to prepare, describe, and transfer this contextual information along with the data itself. This paper reports on a study of the UCLA-based Center for Embedded Networked Sensing (CENS), an interdisciplinary NSF research center that supports collaborations to develop and implement innovative wireless sensor networks. We report here on the development of the CENS Deployment Center, a database for CENS deployment information. The goals of the CENSDC are to facilitate better deployment organization, and to provide a central location for key information that describes the context of data capture. We also describe our plans within CENS to use a tri-partite approach to capture and share sensor data resources using technical recommendations currently being developed within the context of the Open Archive Initiative for Object Reuse and Exchange (OAI-ORE).